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I'm not sure I'd use hellblasters. The cost reduction in the codex has made them worth considering though.

I think it's a simple choice between heavy and rapid fire. Rapid fire just wins this one. Not enough stuff is T8 to justify the extra cost, having only one shot and being heavy - which is especially terrible on a plasma weapon. Heavy plasma devastators fire d3 shots for roughly the same price.

It's harder to decide whether to go for the assault ones. They might actually be best. The fall in strength is very significant though. When overcharged, assault guys will do less damage against t4, t7 and t8. 4 and 7 are very common toughness values so this matters.

I'm not really sure what niche hellblasters fill though. Lascannons seem a better answer to tough things. I think I'd sooner go for plasma inceptors, even at their very high price, so that I could put them where they were needed.

The exception would be raven guard. I think they would do well to bring some rapid fire guys. Assault would also be good, so as to stay at over 12" away more easily. In reality though, the necessity of going forwards to claim objectives means you'll rarely be able to kite stuff anyway, so you may as well go forwards.

The heavy plasma variant is honestly the weakest choice.

i think it really could of done with more base damage to make it more appealing.

I will be sticking with the rapid fire. personally.

With my Raven Guard I was looking at possibly putting together a couple of Mortis Dreadnoughts.

Dual Twin Lascannons are 175 and seem a bit pricey for 1 model. I am kind of thinking of doing the conversion for Dual Mulit-Melta (129) or Dual Heavy Plasma Cannon (135).

Has anyone any experience with the Mortis?

changemod wrote:

jcd386 wrote:
I did some math vs marines, terminators, rhinos, and land raiders.

Unsurprisingly:

At over 24" range, heavy is the best.
At 24" range, assault is best.
Inside 15" rapid fire is the best.

So it really depends on how close you think you can get.

This basically means that heavy straight up has the worst damage potential, only really having range to call on. Doesn't surprise me at all really.

I'd suggest plasma cannon Devastators for that role, much better rate of fire.

That was my thought as well. The added strength really doesn't do a whole lot for them (though they are wounding most things on a 3+ or 2+). In most cases, due to the number of shots, the Assault 2 variant has a better damage output than the Heavy 1. I think they will be almost equal even when the Assault 2 advances, which takes away one of the bonuses of the Heavy variant (range).

Against MEQs
A2 will be 2(4/6)(4/6)(5/6)=.74 wounds
H1 will be (4/6)(5/6)(5/6)=.46
A2 Advance is 2(3/6)(4/6)(5/6)=.55
Against GEQs
A2 will be 2(4/6)(5/6)(6/6)=1.11
H1 will be (4/6)(5/6)(6/6)=.55
A2 Advance is 2(3/6)(5/6)(6/6)=.84

So it really doesn't make sense to take the heavy.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 Desubot wrote:
The heavy plasma variant is honestly the weakest choice.

i think it really could of done with more base damage to make it more appealing.

I will be sticking with the rapid fire. personally.

The Assault might even still be better than the Rapid Fire, but the Rapid Fire has the range to keep it on par.

Youn wrote:
With my Raven Guard I was looking at possibly putting together a couple of Mortis Dreadnoughts.

Dual Twin Lascannons are 175 and seem a bit pricey for 1 model. I am kind of thinking of doing the conversion for Dual Mulit-Melta (129) or Dual Heavy Plasma Cannon (135).

Has anyone any experience with the Mortis?

Yeah I have a lot of experience here: Quad las is actually one of the cheapest most efficient four lascannon platforms space marines have, only really outdone in efficiency by a Contemptor Mortis with the same loadout.

I would not reccomend dual multi Melta on any Dread platform: Low rate of fire, lowish effective range especially if wanting to get in Melta range. You'd be moving and shooting 2 shots at BS4+ a lot of the time.

As for plasma... Marines have a lot of plasma Platforms, and this isn't really the most efficient way to do it. Basically, compare dreadnought weapon lists to Devastator weapons: If a weapon is on both lists, it's as a rule good if twinned on the dread, inefficient if not.

The other options I'd like to highlight are twin heavy bolter: Two of these on a Mortis gives you the cheapest dread in the game, and a pretty good anti-infantry platform. More efficient point for point and better range than the Redemptor, in fact.

Twin autocannon is very good too, though if you have the Index run it as a venerable dread instead.

So unless i missed something is the FW Seige drill dreadnought now just a seismic hammer?

lame sauce.

changemod wrote:

jcd386 wrote:
I did some math vs marines, terminators, rhinos, and land raiders.

Unsurprisingly:

At over 24" range, heavy is the best.
At 24" range, assault is best.
Inside 15" rapid fire is the best.

So it really depends on how close you think you can get.

This basically means that heavy straight up has the worst damage potential, only really having range to call on. Doesn't surprise me at all really.


I'd suggest plasma cannon Devastators for that role, much better rate of fire.

4 plasma cannons are better than 5 heavy hellblasters vs marines, rhinos, and terminators, but not land raiders. They kill 2.9 terminators, 3.7 marines, do 7.4 wounds to rhinos, and 3.5 to land raiders. These numbers are without cover.

 Desubot wrote:
So unless i missed something is the FW Seige drill dreadnought now just a seismic hammer?

lame sauce.

Yeah, at this point I'd personally just run it as an Ironclad. Same role, cheaper.

 Desubot wrote:
So unless i missed something is the FW Seige drill dreadnought now just a seismic hammer?

lame sauce.

Agreed. It should be a siege drill like what Assault Centurions get. What the hell, FW?

changemod wrote:

 Desubot wrote:
So unless i missed something is the FW Seige drill dreadnought now just a seismic hammer?

lame sauce.

Yeah, at this point I'd personally just run it as an Ironclad. Same role, cheaper.

Honestly have been running them as alternative chain fists for my dreads.

i think i will continue doing that.

changemod wrote:
The other options I'd like to highlight are twin heavy bolter: Two of these on a Mortis gives you the cheapest dread in the game, and a pretty good anti-infantry platform. More efficient point for point and better range than the Redemptor, in fact.

Can you share your thoughts a bit more on this?

Three HB Mortis come out to roughly the same costs as 2 Dakka Redemptors (330 vs. 320).

Both are 36 HB-equivalent shots total, but you get the free rocket and storm bolter shots with the Redemptors.

2x7W vs 13W puts survivability slightly in favor of the Mortis.

Elite vs heavy slot being more beneficial depends on your list, so I'll call that a wash.

Is the extra range worth significantly more to you than the rocket/SB shots?

Thoughts on the Relic Deredeo?

 temoinlanuit wrote:

changemod wrote:
The other options I'd like to highlight are twin heavy bolter: Two of these on a Mortis gives you the cheapest dread in the game, and a pretty good anti-infantry platform. More efficient point for point and better range than the Redemptor, in fact.

Can you share your thoughts a bit more on this?

Three HB Mortis come out to roughly the same costs as 2 Dakka Redemptors (330 vs. 320).

Both are 36 HB-equivalent shots total, but you get the free rocket and storm bolter shots with the Redemptors.

2x7W vs 13W puts survivability slightly in favor of the Mortis.

Elite vs heavy slot being more beneficial depends on your list, so I'll call that a wash.

Is the extra range worth significantly more to you than the rocket/SB shots?

1 Dakka Redemptor costs 212. Though I prefer the 2 Stormbolters for the range which costs 204

 em_en_oh_pee wrote:
Thoughts on the Relic Deredeo?

It's pretty awesome. Great counter to large flyers like the stormraven with it's strength 8 autocannons and helical targeting array. Can be a bullet hose as well with the twin heavy bolters and aiolos. Very survivable with it's invul and 14 wounds.

 temoinlanuit wrote:

changemod wrote:
The other options I'd like to highlight are twin heavy bolter: Two of these on a Mortis gives you the cheapest dread in the game, and a pretty good anti-infantry platform. More efficient point for point and better range than the Redemptor, in fact.

Can you share your thoughts a bit more on this?

Three HB Mortis come out to roughly the same costs as 2 Dakka Redemptors (330 vs. 320).

Both are 36 HB-equivalent shots total, but you get the free rocket and storm bolter shots with the Redemptors.

2x7W vs 13W puts survivability slightly in favor of the Mortis.

Elite vs heavy slot being more beneficial depends on your list, so I'll call that a wash.

Is the extra range worth significantly more to you than the rocket/SB shots?

Your math is wrong, two dakka Redemptors is 404 points, 3 heavy bolter Mortis is 327.

And yeah, the increased ability to stay still and shoot at BS3+ is pretty big.




Automatically Appended Next Post:

 buddha wrote:

 em_en_oh_pee wrote:
Thoughts on the Relic Deredeo?

It's pretty awesome. Great counter to large flyers like the stormraven with it's strength 8 autocannons and helical targeting array. Can be a bullet hose as well with the twin heavy bolters and aiolos. Very survivable with it's invul and 14 wounds.

Yeah, it's benefits are kinda self explanatory: The arms alone are equivalent to a quad autocannon dread, but with +1 strength boosting flexibility nicely. Underneath it has a functional third weapon arm with twin heavy bolter, and whilst the missile launcher isn't as good as a normal Cyclone it's still pretty good. Significant firepower on a durable platform for a good price, even better in the spitfire edition and the anti-air rule is just frosting on the cake.

Should a Dev squad have a full compliment of ablative Brothers or just be 5?

 GreatGranpapy wrote:
Should a Dev squad have a full compliment of ablative Brothers or just be 5?

I would almost always just take the 5 guys. If you are afraid of them dying, hide them in a rhino during the first turn.

I was thinking of putting a captain by a pair of Mortis Dreads with Dual Heavy Plasma. I figure they should That should allow them to fire at Strength 8. Worst case scenario they would take 6 mortal wounds in one turn, if I rolled all 1s twice in a row. And in that case, you deserve to lose the dread.


This means I would be doing 2d3 Strength 8, AP -3 Damage 2. This should be decent amount of dakka.

Youn wrote:
With my Raven Guard I was looking at possibly putting together a couple of Mortis Dreadnoughts.

Dual Twin Lascannons are 175 and seem a bit pricey for 1 model. I am kind of thinking of doing the conversion for Dual Mulit-Melta (129) or Dual Heavy Plasma Cannon (135).

Has anyone any experience with the Mortis?

yes, my friend was using a ravenguard lascannon Morris dread in our doubles games this weekend.

It was pretty good. The long range works really nicely with the RG CT. We worked out that nobody fired a shot at it in the 3 games we played. It did good damage throughout.

I don't recommend the other weapon options. Multi meltas are just worse, more expensive lascannons. And the dread would only have two instead of four. Plasma cannons are the same, but they also kill you.

 em_en_oh_pee wrote:
Thoughts on the Relic Deredeo?

I've used one in 6 games this weekend. Honestly I don't know if it will get another run out soon. It is spoiled by its weak ap. So many vehicles have a 3+ save and it just doesn't end up doing enough.

The other weapons seem pretty bad as well unfortunately. Not enough shots, doing not enough damage, costing too much.

The one good thing about it is that opponents seem to assume that it must be powerful, because it's a forgeworld model. Mine seems to attract a lot of hate, which it mostly shrugs off. It gets charged all the time, often by quite scary things, and they can never kill it, thanks to its 4++ and 14 wounds.

Given a choice, I'd recommend a contemptor mortis with lascannons. It's a bit more expensive than the standard mortis but hitting on a 2+ is great. Looks cooler than a standard dread as well.

Youn wrote:
I was thinking of putting a captain by a pair of Mortis Dreads with Dual Heavy Plasma. I figure they should That should allow them to fire at Strength 8. Worst case scenario they would take 6 mortal wounds in one turn, if I rolled all 1s twice in a row. And in that case, you deserve to lose the dread.


This means I would be doing 2d3 Strength 8, AP -3 Damage 2. This should be decent amount of dakka.

You average 4 shots. So does a quad lascannon dread, and it doesn't blow itself up. The lascannon one costs more, but is vastly better. You've got even bigger problems if moving.

One thing the plasma dread can do is pop the wisdom of the ancients stratagem. If you've got cps to burn, it's not awful.

Yes, I have to agree with the repulsor being good. It's basically a Land Raider but better-- the only drawback of the Repulsor defensively vs shooting is a slightly worse save, but given most anti-tank weapons reduce that 2+ save to a 5+ anyway, having it be 6+ instead is hardly much of a loss.

str00dles1 wrote:

 temoinlanuit wrote:

changemod wrote:
The other options I'd like to highlight are twin heavy bolter: Two of these on a Mortis gives you the cheapest dread in the game, and a pretty good anti-infantry platform. More efficient point for point and better range than the Redemptor, in fact.

Can you share your thoughts a bit more on this?

Three HB Mortis come out to roughly the same costs as 2 Dakka Redemptors (330 vs. 320).

Both are 36 HB-equivalent shots total, but you get the free rocket and storm bolter shots with the Redemptors.

2x7W vs 13W puts survivability slightly in favor of the Mortis.

Elite vs heavy slot being more beneficial depends on your list, so I'll call that a wash.

Is the extra range worth significantly more to you than the rocket/SB shots?

1 Dakka Redemptor costs 212. Though I prefer the 2 Stormbolters for the range which costs 204

Is Battlescribe data off? Mine with double Gatling and 2 SB is 160.

I don't think Battlescribe has updated to the new C:SM.

 Melissia wrote:
I don't think Battlescribe has updated to the new C:SM.

140+36+16+6+2+2

The trouble with the dakka redemptor, or indeed any dakka dread, is that SM infantry provides dakka. 15 intercessors for your troops gives you a bunch of dakka, for instance.

A dakka redemptor is comparable to inceptors. It's only a bit more expensive and has the same S5 shooting, plus its ccw, storm bolters and missile thing. The downside is not being able to deep strike, and getting -1 to hit on most guns if it moves.

On the whole redemptors do seem to do a job. Personally I think I prefer contemptors, for the fact that they hit on a 2+. But the 37 extra points does give you an awful lot of shooting. Even if some of it misses, lots of it will hit.

The contemptor is likely to win if they fight in melee I think. Better hitting and the invulnerable cancel out the 3 extra wounds.

So overall I think the contemptor is more focussed at doing the one job of bashing things in with its fist, while the redemptor is more of an all-rounder. Actually for my imperial fists the redemptor is probably better, as ignoring cover with all that anti-infantry shooting would do a lot.

I can't see any purpose in putting a plasma cannon on a redemptor, except to blow it up on purpose. Salamanders are perhaps an exception here. Salamanders CT is really good for any dread, really.

jcd386 wrote:

 GreatGranpapy wrote:
Should a Dev squad have a full compliment of ablative Brothers or just be 5?

I would almost always just take the 5 guys. If you are afraid of them dying, hide them in a rhino during the first turn.

Not a bad place to put a ancient and or a apothecary with.

Here, actually: My blog post series on Dreadnought units. Bear in mind it's heavily written from the perspective of pure dread armies, so some bias to use there rather than general use.

Seems relevant enough to Space Marine tactics anyhow, and I alluded to it once already.

changemod wrote:
Here, actually: My blog post series on Dreadnought units. Bear in mind it's heavily written from the perspective of pure dread armies, so some bias to use there rather than general use.

Seems relevant enough to Space Marine tactics anyhow, and I alluded to it once already.

Good article, thank you.

No Redemptor though? (EDIT: Found it.)

 Crimson wrote:

changemod wrote:
Here, actually: My blog post series on Dreadnought units. Bear in mind it's heavily written from the perspective of pure dread armies, so some bias to use there rather than general use.

Seems relevant enough to Space Marine tactics anyhow, and I alluded to it once already.

Godd article, thank you.

No Redemptor though?

That's a good post on dreadnoughts.

I think I'd simplify it somewhat, to say "just take contemptors". This is because I think that contemptors fill all of your dreadnought needs.

You're correct to identify the mortis contemptor as probably the best thing to stick lascannons onto. Note that it can now have its typhoon/cyclone missile launcher again. I'm not sure if it's worth the extra 50 points, or if doing so makes it too much of a target. Also, I think that Xiphons are an even better lascannon platform, for a very similar price.

I don’t particularly rate deredeos, and I’ve used mine a fair bit now. To be fair, I built mine for heresy with heavy flamers and they are now quite obviously the wrong choice. But the main complaint is that the anvillus autocannons just don’t have enough AP to be enough of a threat. This makes it hard to justify the deredeo against the contemptor mortis. The deredeo is tougher, but the mortis is significantly more dangerous to vehicles. My deredeo does fire its flamers a lot, because people charge it a lot in order to stop it from firing. I tend to think this is a waste of their time, due to the deredeo's toughness in cc and relative harmlessness, though I do enjoy lighting them on fire as they charge.

Note that you can give relics to the chaplain dreadnought. It's a space marine character, and that's all it needs to be - there's no limitation that you have to be alive. That said, there aren't many relics it can actually have, as it doesn't have the right weapons. There are a few though, like the armour indominatus, the salamanders mantle and the black templar hat.

If playing an all-dreadnought army I think salamanders become the clear preferred option. This goes especially for the ones that hit on 2s, and even more especially for redemptors. The plasma gun becomes a slightly less absurd choice on a salamanders redemptor - and indeed you could stick plasma guns on various other dreads if you felt like it, if using the salamanders CT. But any dread really benefits from that single reroll to hit and wound.

Oh my god emperor i want a black Templar chaplain dread with a hat.

But a T8 character dread sounds annoying too. it has better protection against power fists and thunder hammers in CC against normal marines.

Mandragola wrote:
I think I'd simplify it somewhat, to say "just take contemptors". This is because I think that contemptors fill all of your dreadnought needs.

Ha, nearly, yes. If going for a complete optimisation route the only non-Contemptor dreads you'd need to take are HQ's, Leviathans for being a terrifying fire magnet brick with an overpowered gun and maybe some of the cheaper boxes just for low point value.

I prefer more variation, but yeah.

I don’t particularly rate deredeos, and I’ve used mine a fair bit now. To be fair, I built mine for heresy with heavy flamers and they are now quite obviously the wrong choice. But the main complaint is that the anvillus autocannons just don’t have enough AP to be enough of a threat. This makes it hard to justify the deredeo against the contemptor mortis. The deredeo is tougher, but the mortis is significantly more dangerous to vehicles. My deredeo does fire its flamers a lot, because people charge it a lot in order to stop it from firing. I tend to think this is a waste of their time, due to the deredeo's toughness in cc and relative harmlessness, though I do enjoy lighting them on fire as they charge.

I'm beginning to doubt the efficiency of the missile launcher, though it looks silly without it. Besides that, consider it a more durable autocannon Contemptor with bonus heavy bolters, Skyfire, and a point of strength that makes killing T4 and threatening T7/8 vehicles a bit easier. From that perspective, it's basically a bargain.

If playing an all-dreadnought army I think salamanders become the clear preferred option. This goes especially for the ones that hit on 2s, and even more especially for redemptors. The plasma gun becomes a slightly less absurd choice on a salamanders redemptor - and indeed you could stick plasma guns on various other dreads if you felt like it, if using the salamanders CT. But any dread really benefits from that single reroll to hit and wound.

Yeah, if I play a game without my Bjorn proxy somewhere down the line I have a feeling they'll mysteriously become Salamanders sucessors. I'm a bit too enamoured with the idea of a captain dread though, and besides feel a bit dirty running all kinds of free bonuses my opponent doesn't get.